Who
am I and who am I talking too? That is the question. Whoever you are,
these are the last words of a dying race. A dead race. The story is
terrible to tell, but I feel as if I owe it to my Pride, and my
valiant crew, to tell it. My ship is dying, and with it the last of
my race. As I stare death in the face, I welcome it. I died months
ago, when those Evil Hordes destroyed my Prideworld, my mates. The
battles that I fought and the countless lives that were lost fighting
those Demons of Darkness were all for nothing. The Luren are no more,
and I, K'Stin
am the last surviving officer of our once glorious Empire. How did
this happen you might ask? Only the Little Gods know and they have
abandoned us to our fates. The air aboard ship is becoming bitterly
cold, the oxygen low so I will relate my tale quickly.

The
Luren were a proud and victorious race, climbing up the evolutionary
ladder to become the most dominant predator on our once lush
Homeworld. Our long fangs and claws, combined with our luxurious fur
was the envy of many races (editors
note: white tigers?).
Our aggressive nature was also almost our downfall, our desire for
blood nearly our bane. Even though we left our Homeworld and
established individual Prideworlds, we still fought each other
bitterly. These Pridewars increased our technological growth
dramatically and we spread out to the stars quickly. As time went on
and our technology progressed, each Pride began to specialize in
certain technologies. My own Pride for example became specialists in
higher energy states, developing the powerful Fusion Rooms that
allowed our ships to travel farther with fewer engines and allowed
our weapons to be made more compact. My Pride, the K'Gaga,
also developed the fantastically effective anti-laser armor, but too
late. Those Soulless Hordes who attacked our Empire viciously used
devastating laser weaponry for which we had no match and our
invention of the laser armor was far too late.

The
continued expansion of our Empire led to contact with many alien
races, most of whom fell under our claws. Several races however
proved useful or too difficult to beat in battle and were allocated a
certain status within our vastly expanding Empire. Two of those
races, the huge rock humanoid Branx and the diminutive Korel fought
by our side when the Sons of Death discovered us. Our cowardly gas
giant aliens, the Mibrannu, hid from them and abandoned us, Kalki-ma
take them!

We,
the Luren, fought many Pridewars amongst ourselves but when a large
alien empire was discovered eighty yaregs
ago, we came together as a race, led by the Seven Great Prides. These
Great Prides, including the Castagi, Panth, and the D'Shanna,
forced the abandonment of our individual Pridefleets and adopted the
dreadnoughts and heavy cruisers of our fleets into the Imperial
Fleet. These aliens, the reptilian Shern destroyed several Pride
colonies without even attempting to communicate and it was
war.
Ah, war is glorious and our battles with the alien Shern were
glorious. They utilized small attack craft against our warfleets but
we built up a massive Fortress Ring within our Empire to withstand
their attacks, which took up nearly a third of the total defense
budget to maintain. This impenetrable barrier became the foundation
of our defenses but was simply pushed aside when those Demons of
Darkness came for us from the outer reaches. The battles with the
Shern were epic, and I too fought in them, quickly reaching the
exalted rank of
Admirashk.
Although we, the Luren, are a short-lived race, we fight. I was
fourteen yaregs
when I fought my first battle with the Shern. We never took
prisoners, and neither did the Shern but it never was really a fight
to the death, just a war of glory, of battles, of strength. At the
same time our Empire became aware of a vicious genocidal race
bordering our two states. Calling themselves the Shraix, these
feathered aliens launched brutal attacks against both our empires.
This was their death.....

We
and the Shern have never stopped our fighting even as we destroyed
the alien Shraix. Maybe that is why the Little Gods turned against
us, turning their backs on us. We showed no mercy to the Shraix, and
none was shown to us when those Unstoppable Fiends came for us. At
this time we also began production of a new class of warship. These
newly built “monitors” were huge, larger than any other known
warship and would have given us a substantial advantage had we been
able to deploy enough of them. One class, the Death
from Above,
with heavy capital missile batteries, would have made a significant
impact on the course of the war. Who knows, maybe we could have been
able to stop those Insufferable Beasts if we just had more of these
vessels.

And
now I will speak of those Foes of Light, those Destroyers of Prides,
the Evil Ones. They came out of the darkness, attacking all and
sparing none. Our intelligence services began picked up disturbing
reports of Shern movements....away from the our front lines. Our
listening posts and survey fleets began reporting unusual activity at
this time as well. A major security threat was obviously on the
scene. The Shern ambassador met with the Seven Great Prides, asking
for a armistice. He was reportedly turned down and Fleet headquarters
immediately sent dispatches to every major fleet concentration in the
Optima Thule Combat Region, where I was stationed with the 31st
Warfleet. Our orders were to move against and occupy as many Shern
planets as possible. I was stunned at the news but obeyed. We, the
Luren, had never been able to significantly invade and hold any part
of the vast Shern Empire but now their border fleets were gone and I
personally supervised the occupation of sixteen Shern planets. Our
elite Orbital Drop Commandos rapidly seized the starports and ground
forces were quickly moved in. We triumphed....or had we?

At
this point, I exalted in the new-found territories we had conquered.
Our non-sentient females would have a place to raise our litters, and
new glory was found for my Pride. A few Shern light forces were left
in these systems but my task force, which consisted of twelve
superdreadnoughts, three dreadnoughts, twenty heavy cruisers, and
twenty five destroyers blew them away with little damage to my own
units. My crews were gaining valuable experience in combating the
system defenses and the combat made the blood run hot in my veins.
Finally, we were overcoming our enemies but a slow dread filled me.
The absence of an single Shern capital ship in these important border
systems gave me pause, for which I am grateful because the following
months proved to be a nightmare.

The
Shern Empire was dying a grisly death from two different directions.
Our Branx and Korel allies provided planetary garrisons for these
newly captured worlds, the Branx proving especially useful as they
came from high-gravity worlds. Our intelligence services was unable
to discern who the Shern's
new
enemies were. Facing adversaries on two fronts, the Shern were
rapidly collapsing. I held my command in a strategic Shern system,
the Roaa System, as my forces mopped up the last of the large space
stations and bases orbiting the four T-worlds in this system. The
Roaa System was a great prize, one that I would hold for my Pride
only, or so I thought. A few weeks after we had taken control of the
system and exterminated the Shern populace, we discovered what the
Shern were fighting, and the discovery was horrifying.

On
the fifth day on the holy month of
Hannik'as,
I was shocked to discover a superhuge alien spacecraft had stealthily
moved to within 60 light seconds of Roaa III. This titanic warship
must have had some kind of stealthy coating or stealth field to be
able to sneak up on my ships without being picked up by our sensors.
Immediately the alert was sounded and my command ship, the
Bonecrusher,
began to pry from this ship it's
secrets.
Using a very advanced engine system, it was moving towards us at
impossible speeds and it was a titan!
One of the most important aspects of our race was development of new
technology and we had the
fastest engines in known space, always pulling ahead of the Shern
when in combat but these aliens, these Dark Devils, were impossibly
fast. Larger than even one of our newest Monitors, this vessel had
the audacity to challenge my command area....but I soon learned, to
my shock, that just one of these vessels was more than enough to
destroy any conventional fleet.

As
my escorting destroyers closed on the enemy and opened fire with a
heavy missile spread, the alien vessel launched small warships from
the surface of the mammoth ship. Hundreds of these vessels began to
close and detonate near my escorts, damaging them little. Apparently
the Demons of Darkness noted the same results and began ramming
my now desperate destroyers. The huge alien vessel also savaged my
lighter vessels with a heavy laser fire, quickly burning though my
forces best antilaser armor. With impossible speed and devastating
results, my escorting destroyers were overwhelmed and I burned in
anger at their loss. Hundreds of Luren, many from my own Pride, had
just died at the hands of these unknown aliens and my grief was
overwhelming. I had never faced a loss like this in my entire
military career; we were totally outclassed. I ordered my heavy units
to open fire as soon as the range closed but was stunned to see the
enemy vessel open up a heavy missile spread from far outside my own
missile range. And the missile launchers those Soulless Hordes used
fired twice as fast as my own! Shock reverberated through the combat
information center as annihilation
devices
began detonating against our shields! Although long theorized, no one
had ever used antimatter warheads before and the ships under my
command began taking deadly hits from incoming missiles and small
ramming warships filled with these warheads!

Although
I had three of the new Greater
Death-class
superdreadnoughts under my command, which not only had heavy lasers
and capital graser mounts, but also a fantastically destructive
capital graser spinal mount, I also had a total of three
Bloody Fang-class
dreadnoughts which concentrated missile fire on the huge enemy
warship. We did little damage to our foes armor and shields, and then
it returned fire. It was my fault, I should have retreated once I saw
the annihilation devices in action, and the destruction they caused.
Ship after ship died under hellspawned fire and my own command ship
was heavily damaged by ramming vessels. Impossibly, that impregnable
titan shrugged off our extensive missile salvos with ease.

Our
flight in retreat to Optima Thule was one of despair, and dark
thoughts assailed me. Over half my total tonnage, eight
superdreadnoughts and twelve heavy cruisers, had been destroyed by
just
one
of these alien ships. I hated these Demons of Death, hated them for
killing my littermates, my crew. I sought the refuge of Optima Thule,
which was part of the massive Fortress Ring and took my command to
the Sector refit yards for much needed repairs. At this time my major
warships received the latest weapons, the Capital Missile Pods,
micronized tractor beams, and an automated rapid-deploying
minedropper system.

As
I pondered our recent defeat, I knew that time was against us. My
elite crew's moral was crushed by our grinding losses and the Sector
Governor refused to release us back into battle. He sent my ravaged
task force to help our allies, the Korel. The Korel Empire Collapse
came at a critical time for our Empire and I was badly out of place
when the attack came to Optima Thule. I remember the arrogance of the
Governor, of how many dreadnoughts and superdreadnoughts he had
amassed from the high-population Innerworlds, and his cruel treatment
of me and my crew. Only their unswervingly loyalty to me kept me in
command, for which I was grateful. I had fought and died and bled for
my crews, and everyone of them knew that.

The
eighty dreadnoughts and superdreadnoughts were not enough and the
Optima Thule Combat Region fell amid a massive invasion of Soulless
Hordes. They were unstoppable. Chaos reigned as the Sector Capital
fell; that had never happened before and the military chain of
command was badly disrupted. I learned that my arch-foe, B'Shant had
rallied the remains of the Fleet and fought a desperate retreat
across the Sector, abandoning world after world to those Demons of
Darkness. I choked on the success of my nemesis but only the Empire
mattered.

The
governmental apparatus, long accustomed to the security of being far
behind the lines was paralyzed by indecision...all but Prime Minister
J'Dawn. He summoned all available fleet forces to the Homeworld. We
moved quickly to reach the planet, desperate to join in it's defense and
we drilled with our new Missile Pods and constantly ran battle damage
tests as we raced through warp point after warp point. I feared being
too late to save our Cherished Home from destruction. In the heart of
every Luren is the love of the Home, it's proper place at the center
of our 180-world Empire. It had it's own massive defensive fortress
ring but reports out of the disaster at Optima Thule indicated that
the Servants of Death had used a unique engine system that totally
bypassed conventional warp point defenses. Indeed, the most
spectacular thing about the Unstoppable Fiends was this strange
engine system, which allowed a much greater mass to pass through the
warp point, and spit it out randomly at great intervals, far from the
warp point.

At
Kessendra I loaded several new missile types, including the newest
Lamprey Missiles and the area-effect x-ray laser warheads, both of
which I hoped would be effective against those Soulless Hordes. At
Snowhi, the Planetary Governor briefed my command staff and I while
we were topping off for reactor mass. Luren Intelligence was learning
about these Demons of Darkness. Apparently they were techno-organic
creatures unlike anything we had ever seen before. In fact, they were
so unlike Luren that our battle-hardened eMarines
actually panicked at the sight of these floating, crawling, tearing
beasts. Their damnable missiles and small boarding craft were
extremely efficient and capable of out-ranging most of our missile
ships, including the Bloody
Fangs. At
Toth Base, I acquired a newly completed Death
from Above
monitor, vastly increasing our firepower. My crew was heartened at
this, although it spread our overall crews thinly. I was urged by my
chief-of-staff and Capistan
K'Stan to shift my flag to the more survivable monitor, but I
refused.

It
took over six weeks to reach the Homeworld and massive refugee fleets
blocked the way. My own forces were held up for nearly twenty hours
at the Karego-At warp point, awaiting the panicked commercial vessels
to pass through first. This attack on the Empire had brought the
Prides together as no other had, as I saw when we arrived in orbit of
the Homeworld. Traditionally neutral, the Prime Minister had
abdicated his authority to GranAdmirashk
Kale, one of the Imperial Fleet's most honored officers. He
ruthlessly drilled all the ships under his command and I was assigned
an outer sector to defend, near the moon Hur-At-Hur. Massive
planetary defenses circled the Homeworld and elegant Orbital
Beanstalks lifted it's traffic into space, one of which connected
with the Empire's largest spaceport, R'Kassi Station.

We
were ready, but my soul said we weren't. I had done my best, as had
GranAdmirashk
Kale
, and the Fleet waited. The Foes of Light came. Fleet Command HQ
detected incoming warp signatures, fifteen of them and them were
massive!!! Deep range scans confirmed it was those Bringers of Death.
I learned to hate their annihilation devices with a passion. If we
only had enough time to develop them we might have stood a chance, if
only. I was not afraid of Death, and neither was my valiant crew.
No, they wanted the fight, sought it, and we fought as
one
when it came. Fifteen of those stupendous, unstoppable titans. I felt
like a mouse before a lionesk,
sure to be squashed under foot. GranAdmirashk
Kale sought to meet the Enemy and the Battle of Hur-At-Hur began.
Nearly seventy dreadnoughts and superdreadnoughts waited in orbit as
they came, and then they stared to die. I put on my neurohelmet (it
was little more than a headband) and began thinking commands.

I
recall little of the battle, it's surrounded in a grey fog. Parts
stick out though, including the destruction of dreadnought
Grey Death,
my littermates command ship and the destruction of R'Kassi Station by
those damnable missiles and then the orbital beanstalk falling into
the atmosphere of the Homeworld and I knew, just knew, that hundreds
of thousands of our people had just died when it impacted the
southern continent. I remember giving the command to fire the Missile
Pods and prayed that these Unstoppable Hordes would pay in blood.
Astonishingly, large black globes came up and shielded these
Insufferable Beasts from our overwhelming Missile Pod spread, making
it totally ineffective. I had used my best claws, and lost. At this
time the Unstoppable Fiends deployed their latest weapon, the dis
warhead. A total shock to a already shocked fleet, this missile
warhead was built out of disassembling nanobots which immediately
began to disintegrate organic matter, all
organic matter, including living flesh. These nanomachines broke down
matter at the molecular level, turning it into undifferentiated
grayish goo. Would our terror never end? The annihilation devices
were deadly enough, destroying ship after ship under my command and
now this???

The
GranAdmirashk
was dead and command had devolved to the Prime Minister, who was out
of contact with our forces. Chaos reigned and, unthinkably, ships
began to flee for the closest warp points. Half disassembled warships
crept away and even that coward B'Shant fled with a remnant of the
Fleet, abandoning our Homeworld to these Destroyers of Prides. I
wouldn't flee, and neither would any of the ships under my command.
Those titans continued firing their horrible missiles at us and our
grasers tore back into them. Our pinannces and cutters rammed these
titans by the hundreds, and they responded in kind against my own
ships. Then, impossibly, two
of these Demonic Titans exploded and then the Clawed
Glory was
on fire and out formation, lifepods spewing from its sides. The
dreadnought
Pouncer
broke in two and the Ribreaker
exploded under a massive spread of annihilation missiles. The
superdreadnought Flesh
Render
died, eaten alive by dis. The battle-ravaged hulk Death
from Afar
was rammed repeatedly by dozens of small Devil warships, and the
monitor exploded with heavy loss of life. The Bonecrusher
took many hits, but survived. A direct hit amidships by that demonic
laser fire damaged Fusion Room One, which went into emergency
shutdown barely in time. The bridge was a wreck, CIC a shambles, and
acrid smoke flooded the command deck. I was severely injured by
white-hot flying battlesteel and could only watch in hated horror as
the Soulless Horde opened fire on my Homeworld. The pain was
excruciating and mercifully I blacked out.

I
became conscious in the sickbay, and asked how the battle faired. The
Surgeon, L'Ris, told me that the Fleet had been routed, the Homeworld
lost. White hot anger tore at me and luckily I was in restraints. The
rage soon passed and bitterness and dark thoughts clouded my mind as
I lay in recovery. I knew that Capistan
K'Stan would regroup and take us to the nearest Fleet Base for
repairs, I knew him that well. The Bonecrusher
was badly damaged and my crew lay on gurneys all around me, tore and
ripped and suffering. This was my darkest hour. After several hours
of consoling my wounded crew, I demanded and received a situation
report from my intelligence officer, the only surviving member of my
staff. My task force had taken heavy losses and only a few heavy
cruisers had survived and escorted as away from the battle. No
capital ships had survived, other than the Bonecrusher.
I lay numb, shocked at our extremely heavy losses. Many Luren ships
had tried to ram those Unstoppable Fiends warships but they quickly
became encased in impenetrable black globes, foiling the attempts. We
were limping towards B'Shalli'La, the major Fleet Base and repair
yards in Orrimy Sector where Capistan
K'Stan would seek additional escorts and battleline units. I
despaired, however. Our best ships and crews were gone, the Homeworld
even now being assimilated into Mindless Hordes and B'Shant, ah
B'Shant the
coward.
He had fled, taking the Fleet with him and I knew where he would go:
his
Prideworld.

The
following weeks were a nightmare, shrouded in hated memories. The
Disaster at the Homeworld crushed my crew's morale and even I
suffered from the same heavy weight. We arrived at the Orrimy System,
only to find the Fleet Base stripped bare of ships and only a
skeleton staff. Falling further back into the Empire was our only
hope, trying to buy time for our Prides. I ignored the Sector
Governor's all-ships order to rally at Praunce, the Sector Capital,
and I headed home.
I
had had time to think, and I knew the Empire was dying. Nothing
I
could do could save it, no mere mortal could. The Fleet was gone, our
morale dissipated, and our hope dead. I formulated a plan however to
save the Empire, at least a part of it. My Pride would live, if
I sought the safety of the Unknown Territories beyond the Frontier,
and I would do anything in my power to do just that. Confiscating
ship after ship from the commerce lanes, I readily built up a small
transport fleet, which was capable of lifting several small colonies
of Luren to safety.

Hain
Sector fell, then Llannedd and I knew that those Soulless Demons were
following behind us. Desperation filled my mind and I left six heavy
cruisers behind in Angkor Apeiron to harry our foe. They were
equipped with long-range missiles and advanced boarding sleds and I
hoped that they would do some damage to our implacable enemies. They
were ordered to survive if possible and regroup with us at Novotny,
or ram if badly damaged.

Transiting
the warp point at Yone's World, we stumbled into the Servants of
Death, and my beloved
Bonecrusher
was lost to me. A high-population world deep within Praunce Sector,
Yone's World was supposed to be a refuge for us but the three titanic
Monsters in orbit of the planet proved otherwise. They were
assimilating the orbital forts and responded ponderously as I fired
my Missile Pods at long range, destroying forty escorting Devilships
but then my light task force was overwhelmed. Their small ramming
ships came at us and my superdreadnought was unable to outpace them,
taking hit after hit until all was lost.

I
am not sure how I survived the battle, although I revived in a escape
pod several hours later. One of the civilian ships that I had ordered
to disperse at the first sign of the Enemy, picked me up, and
continued towards my Prideworld, which was now only twelve warp
points away. I have never thought about the loss of my command ship,
the pain is too great. They had been with me for five good years and
proved to be an excellent crew, above and beyond what any battlefield
commander would want. I salute them....

The
heavy cruiser Pride
of Was'hain became
my command ship, and Capistan
Yuan received me graciously. I quickly became acclimated with the
Pride's
crew and found them most capable, and Capistan
Yuan
highly professional. The Pride
was one of the Fleet's newest warships, with rapid-fire missile
launchers and cloaking capability. Finally, as we orbited my
homeworld, I wept. Kin'Galli's World was lightly populated and I knew
that I could only rescue a few of my Pride from their impending doom.
I was an officer, bound by duty to protect these people, and I
couldn't. My rage filled me.....Capistan
Yuan saw to the evacuation, with priority given to my crew who had
littermates on the planet below. My own Clan was brought aboard, my
bondmates and latest cublings as well and I rejoiced over them,
licking them and holding them until I fell asleep with them
surrounding me.

Leaving
my Prideworld to it's fate was the most difficult thing I ever had to
do. Although I had planned on staying on Kin'Galli,
Capistan Yuan
insisted that I oversee the Evacuation Fleet's retreat, citing my
overwhelming experience and leadership. Only after several hours of
arguing with him and finally by the order of the System Governor, I
reluctantly agreed and tallied our forces. Seven heavy cruisers and
twenty-eight transports was all that was left of the Luren Empire but
a resolve had formed in my heart.

Three
more weeks and we reached the last Luren world along the Frontier.
Poweet was a small colony and we picked up provisions for our long
journey. With Capistan
Yaun's agreement, I dropped off the last of our Battlesats, hoping
that they and the small space stations could defend the planet
against those Insufferable Beasts. I doubted it though but had to
make the effort. The vast Unknown Territories lay ahead and I was
hoping to keep those devils far, far behind us. We entered the
Unknown through warp point two and began our journey.

Months
passed and our colonists were getting frustrated. I wanted to
establish our new Luren colony far from the Empire to ensure it's
survival and several times we played cat and mouse with those Demons
of Darkness through warp point after warp point. And the it happened.
Coming into a Blue Giant system, we began a standard survey, knowing
that this system would yield many warp points to escape through. My
greatest fear is that we were running in circles, or that we would
end up moving back to the direction of the Empire. Our surveying was
rudely interrupted by several warships erupting from a warp point
very close to the Blue Giant, and my command!

I
sounded the battle alert but it was too late. Several
battlecruiser-sized Demon warships emerged after their smaller
cousins, all intent on destroying us. The small escorts screamed in
on my command and the heavy cruisers Kimdiss
and Grinder,
as well as three colony ships, were rammed and destroyed in brilliant
balls of annihilating matter. We began dumping Missile Pods out and
firing them, hoping for a lucky kill as the Devilships shields tried
to stabilize. We managed to cripple the lead Devilship and my crew
roared! I ordered the colony ships to head to the nearest warp point,
which we had discovered just a few moments ago but not yet surveyed.

The
battle was desperate, and we, the Luren, were losing. Those
Unstoppable Hordes began firing at my command, and my ships died. The
heavy cruisers K'Galli
and
eNerrup
were destroyed by missile fire even as the first colony ships
transited the warp point, a mere 50 light seconds away. The Pride
was hit over and over by missiles and laser fire, but we continued
on, desperate to reach and escort the colony ships to safety. L'Rowl
and Hannow
Glory
were reduced to burning wreckage by devastating laser fire as we
retreated to the warp point and then only my ship faced these
Demonships alone. The warp point was close and we passed through it
while bracketed by laserfire, nauseated by the violent transit and
then sudden destruction came upon us!

The
Pride's
shields went down after being battered by some unknown force and
gigantic thudding was heard throughout the ship. The main viewscreen
focused and I realized we had inadvertently stumbled into our death.
The warp point had emerged right in the middle of a asteroid field
and the drifting hull plating and dispersing energy informed me that
our last best hope had just died. All
the colony ships that transited the warp point were dead, destroyed
by the dreadful battering that the Pride
had just taken. I watched as Demonship after Demonship emerged from
the warp point and were destroyed by immense boulders. But we were
dead.

The
main Fusion Room was so badly damaged that we drifted out of the
asteroid field with no power. My main engineer tells me that the life
support unit has been destroyed beyond repair and there is no
habitable planet in this system for refuge. The engines are
inoperable without the Fusion Room. I had done my best but bitter
tears streaked my fur and white-hot anger burned within me as I
realized my failure. My race was dead, my crew dying, and it was my
fault, my inability to think us out of these hated situations. I hate
the Little Gods for abandoning us to our fates! And you, you who hear
this testimony, I hate you
also! I hate you because I am now dead and you are alive, my race
long gone and yours thrives. But most of all I hate the fact that you
will dissect my beloved ship, disturbing our tomb, our resting place.
May Kalki-ma take you....and may the god of grace, May'eskor watch
over you if you ever stumble across those Destroyers of Prides, those
Unspeakable Fiends, those Unstoppable Hordes.....fair well.

*Discovered
by survey ship TNS Fearless
on 1/12/65

LUREN
WARSHIP CLASSES

Bloodied Claw-class
dreadnought (Gr)

Bloody Fang-class
dreadnought (Rc)

Bloody Grimace-class
superdreadnought (Rc)

Bonegrinder-class
superdreadnought (Wa)

Clawed-class
battlecruiser (Wa)

Crushing Glory-class
superdreadnought (Wc)

Death From Above-class
monitor (Wc/Wa)

Fang-class
battlecruiser (Gr)

Fleshrender-class
superdreadnought (Gr)

Fur-class
heavy cruiser (Gr)

Greater Death-class
superdreadnought (Grc/Lhv/Grc-SpM)

Grinder-class
heavy cruiser (Lhv)

Hunter-class
destroyer (Gr)

Little-class
destroyer (Wa)

Mane-class
battlecruiser (SLED2)

Mauler-class
battlecruiser (Pod)

Pouncer-class
dreadnought (Wa)

Pride-class
heavy cruiser (Wa)

Ribreaker-class
battlecruiser (Wc)

Scent-class
destroyer (Dz)

Swift Death-class
dreadnought (Wc)

SEVEN
GREAT PRIDES

Castagi

Darnelli

D’Shanna

Grointh

Jab’ezz

Planth

Zal

LUREN
OFFICER RANKS

Gran’Admirashk

Admirashk

Na’Admirashk

Capistan

Commanesk

Gres’Letenesk

Letenesk

Les’Letensk

Ensesk

ADDITIONAL
NPR CHARACTERISTICS

One of the problems I
have run into in the Starfire game is that NPRs seem a little wooden. It seems like every
NPR is either stuck up or everyone's friend. So instead of me just
guessing(and possibly being inconsistent when the number of races
gets bigger), I came up with some more characteristics to help define
a NPR.

RACIAL EXPANSION:
(1-100). Just how willingly(badly?) does the race want to expand?
Combined with the RM it will tell you what lengths they are willing
to go when looking for more room to expand.

RACIAL LOYALTY:
(1-100, initially). This number is the base number and is the value
used for each race it meets. The number will
be modified by actions and events between the
two races. When the going gets tough, does he stick with you or jump
ship?

RACIAL TRUST:
(1-100). How willing is the race to trust another race. Will they
believe what you say? This will be modified by the actions of the
other race. It will go up when words and actions match, and down when
they don't.

RACIAL
AGRESSIVENESS: (1-100). How aggressive is
the race. Are they willing to push a situation or not? Will they tend
to go beyond what would seem prudent? How willing he is to back up
his words with actions? This number is also used to determine how
much of his fleet a NPR is willing to commit outside of his home
system.